Trump’s legal team to file complaint on Comey

Published 11:53 am, Friday, June 9, 2017

President Donald Trump’s personal attorney is planning to file a complaint against former FBI Director James Comey for details he revealed during his congressional testimony.

Trump’s legal team will file a complaint early next week with the Justice Department’s inspector general. The complaint will take issue with Comey’s revelation that he asked a friend to pass along to a reporter notes he took of his private conversations with the president.

That’s according to a person close to the legal team who agreed to speak ahead of the filing on condition that the person’s name is not used.

House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi says she has concerns about President Donald Trump’s “fitness for office” — and thinks he needs more sleep.

Pelosi is citing Trump’s habit of early morning tweeting, as well as Thursday’s congressional testimony by former FBI Director James Comey. Comey told senators he believed Trump fired him because of the Russia investigation.

Trump has come out with a tweet early Friday: “Despite so many false statements and lies, total and complete vindication ... and WOW, Comey is a leaker.”

Pelosi is assessing the president this way: “I’m concerned about his fitness for office.”

She says she believes part of the problem is a lack of shut-eye.

In her words — “More sleep might be a solution for him.”

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8:40 a.m.

A Republican member of the Senate Intelligence committee says Congress should obtain any tapes that President Donald Trump might have of his conversations with the man he fired as FBI director — James Comey.

Comey testified before that committee on Thursday, and Sen. Susan Collins tells MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” that she found him “credible, candid and thorough.”

The Maine Republican says Comey was wrong to leak his private conversation with the president. Collins says Comey’s motivation “may have been a good one,” but says Comey should have given that document to the Senate committee.

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6:15 a.m.

President Donald Trump is asserting that fired FBI Director James Comey’s testimony to Congress represents “total and complete vindication.”

Trump, who did not post on his Twitter account as Comey appeared before the Senate intelligence committee Thursday, sent a tweet at daybreak Friday. In the post, the president said: “Despite so many false statements and lies, total and complete vindication... and WOW, Comey is a leaker.”

Trump was referring to Comey’s revelation that he had passed on to a friend a written memo he’d made detailing a meeting with Trump at the White House — and had asked a friend to give it to a reporter for the New York Times.

During much of the increasingly heated debate surrounding the FBI’s investigation of Russia’s role in the election, Trump has chafed over news leaks, arguing that news organizations had not given them proper attention.

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5:20 a.m.

A senior Russian lawmaker has dismissed the testimony of former FBI Director James Comey as insignificant.

Comey, who testified before a Senate committee on Thursday, asserted that President Donald Trump had fired him to interfere with an investigation of Russia’s ties to the Trump campaign and reaffirmed the intelligence community’s conclusion that Russia meddled in the election.

Alexei Pushkov, chairman of the information policy committee at the upper chamber of the Russian parliament, dismissed Comey’s testimony as a “big bubble,” adding that it “will not help Trump’s adversaries to start impeachment proceedings.”

President Donald Trump will take questions from reporters a day after former FBI Director James Comey accused him of lying in stunning testimony.

Trump has scheduled a joint news conference for Friday afternoon with visiting Romanian President Klaus Iohannis.

He’ll also be participating in an infrastructure event at the Department of Transportation and holding meetings with his Romanian counterpart before departing for New Jersey, where he’ll spend the weekend at one if his properties.

Comey asserted Thursday that Trump fired him because of the ongoing investigation into possible ties between Trump’s campaign and Russia. Comey also bluntly accused the White House of spreading “lies, plain and simple.”

Trump has been unusually silent on Twitter and declined to answer shouted questions from reporters Thursday about the testimony.

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3:35 a.m.

Former FBI Director James Comey has laid bare months of White House distrust in highly anticipated testimony before Congress.

Comey accused the administration of spreading “lies” and bluntly asserted that President Donald Trump had fired him to interfere with an investigation of Russia’s ties to the Trump campaign. His gripping account of interactions with Trump underscored the discord that soured their relationship.

Facing a Senate committee Thursday, Comey portrayed Trump as dismissive of the FBI’s independence. He also made clear that he interpreted Trump’s request to end an investigation into his former national security adviser as an order coming from the president.

Comey also revealed that he’d orchestrated the public release of information about his private conversations with the president. He said it was an effort to further the investigation.